Of Heretics and Hypocrites… What is a pastor to do?
In Bad Religion, Ross Douthat has written a fascinating version of what’s gone wrong in American religion over the last seventy years. He reveals through an historic account, the drift of the Christian church from the doctrinal pillars it once knew to pop versions of spirituality primarily outside the walls of church buildings. Of course Douthat understands Christianity has always had heresy as part of the tempering of orthodoxy. Yet he highlights that today there is a migration toward anti-intellectual self-help non-conformist spirituality in place of religious dogma.
As a committed Catholic with his own history in various Christian traditions (Episcopalian, Evangelical Charismatic-Pentecostal), Douthat is invested in the future of the church. As a journalist for the New York Times he has a platform and access to resources to form an in-depth reflective look at Christianity in America. Douthat owns that Bad Religion is his take on the state of American religion and religious culture and how we arrived at the place we are at today.
From the outset of Bad Religion, Douthat states the value of Christianity for all of American culture today and is worth noting. “Believers and non-believers have benefited from the role that institutional Christianity has traditionally played in our national life—its communal role, as a driver of assimilation and a guarantor of social peace, and its prophetic role, as a curb against our national excesses and a constant reminder of our national ideals. Both doubters and believers stand to lose if religion in the age of heresy turns out to be complicit in our fragmented communities, our collapsing families, our political polarization, and our weakened social ties. Both doubters and believers will inevitably suffer from a religious culture that supplies more moral license than moral correction, more self-satisfaction than self-examination, more comfort than chastisement.”[1] His statements are powerful, not just as an argument, but because of the ripple effect of Christianity on society as a whole when the principles of Christianity are truly lived. He speaks to the need of Christianity to be lived and taught for the good of the world and not just believers.
Bad Religion presses in on some of the underlying reasons for the problem in my own doctoral research. My work is concentrated on studying the largely missing element of discipleship in the American church today and how this affects the future of the church. I’ve begun with reading on the topic of discipleship and disciple-making as well as continuing to interview pastors on their perspective and methods of discipleship. My research is giving an inside look to the argument of Douthat’s text, revealing that indeed, many people have not had a well-rooted faith without the relationship of a seasoned pastor or mature disciple intentionally walking alongside them. Dallas Willard identifies this trend in The Great Omission, “we omit the making of disciples and enrolling people as Christ’s students, when we should let all else wait for that. Then we also omit, of necessity, the step of taking our converts through training that will bring them ever-increasingly to do what Jesus directed.”[2] “Churches are filled with “undiscipled disciples,” as Jess Moody has called them. Of course there is in reality no such thing. Most problems in contemporary churches can be explained by the fact that members have never decided to follow Christ.”[3]
While the church has shrunk over that past decades as the population has grown, Douthat explains there are fewer and fewer ministers available and my own research exposes most pastors as primarily focused on keeping up vision, buildings, and programming to continue with a steady number of members. Many pastors don’t have the time (and some don’t have interest) to disciple people. In addition, many do not personally mentor their future leaders. This makes it challenging for people to seek the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, as Douthat appeals for believers to do, when they do not even have a sense of what that kingdom is or what it means to be righteous. Conversion is needed but so is discipleship. Once a week church gatherings and programs do little to break down the influences outside Christianity.
Two key terms are emphasized in Douthat’s text as the problem and solution to Christianity in American culture today, heretic and sanctity. A heretic as defined by Mirriam-Webster is a person who differs in opinion from established religious dogma[4] while sanctity is described as holiness of life and character or godliness.[5] I would add to heretic, hypocrite: “a person who puts on a false appearance of virtue or religion.”[6] If American Christianity, and thus culture is to change, both the belief and the action (as Hunter notes in his To Change the World) need to change and become more pious. “To make any difference in our common life, Christianity must be lived-not as a means to social cohesion or national renewal, but as an end unto itself.”[7] This is the responsibility of disciple-makers, pastors and lay people alike, that we as the church would live holy lives by the standards of the Bible, and disciple others into the same.
Each pastor I have spoken with about their discipleship methods has said that they meet with people directly whether in small groups or one on one to be relationally present and walk with them toward Jesus. Their methods are different, some more formal than others. They all noted the slowness, intentionality and imperfections, yet found it as their most effective and important work. This long work of discipleship is the first and most important growth for any of the hopeful futures Douthat suggests in America.[8]
[1] Douthat, Ross. Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics. Free Press: New York. 2012, 16.
[2] Willard, Dallas. The Great Omission: Reclaiming Jesus’s Essential Teachings on Discipleship. Harper Collins ebooks. 2006, 5-6.
[3] Willard, 4.
[4] Merriam-Webster, s.v. “Heretic,” accessed March 22, 2018, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/heretic.
[5] Merriam-Webster, s.v. “Sanctity,” accessed March 22, 2018, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sanctity.
[6] Merriam-Webster, s.v. “Hypocrite,” accessed March 22, 2018, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hypocrite
[7] Douthat, 293
[8]“Douthat suggests four reasons for hope: the rootlessness of our postmodern age will finally motivate a return to Christian orthodoxy’s satisfying account of human origins and destiny; our culture’s corruption will accelerate the growth of communities of virtue; the flame of faith will fan out from the increasingly Christian global South; and the new millennium’s various crises may well revive faith, as the ravages of war did before.” Anderson, Ryan. “Douthat, Ross. Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics.” Claremont Review of Books (2012), 87-89.
About the Author
Trisha Welstad
Trisha is passionate about investing in leaders to see them become all God has created them to be. As an ordained Free Methodist elder, Trisha has served with churches in LA and Oregon, leading as a pastor of youth and spiritual formation, a church planter, and as a co-pastor of a church restart. Trisha currently serves as leadership development pastor at Northside Community Church in Newberg, OR. Over the last five years Trisha has directed the Leadership Center, partnering with George Fox and the Free Methodist and Wesleyan Holiness churches. The Leadership Center is a network facilitating the development of new and current Wesleyan leaders, churches and disciples through internships, equipping, mentoring and scholarship. In collaboration with the Leadership Center, Trisha serves as the director of the Institute for Pastoral Thriving at Portland Seminary and with Theologia: George Fox Summer Theology Institute. She is also adjunct faculty at George Fox University. Trisha enjoys throwing parties, growing food, listening to the latest musical creations by Troy Welstad and laughing with her two children.12 responses to “Of Heretics and Hypocrites… What is a pastor to do?”
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Trisha
Great point in rooting out the problems in American Christianity, lack of discipleship. I am finding that to be the root of my problem as well, inward focused Christians. Seems following the path Christ set before us would solve a bunch of our problems.
Jason
Jason, I am interested how that plays out in your congregation? Do people look for mentors/dicsiplers or does it seem more like your responsibility as the pastor?
I agree, following Jesus would be best but I think the narrow road is hard to find/choose when there are so many pleasing wider paths that produce enough to get us by for now without seeming to ‘keep us from heaven.’
Trisha,
I like how you connected Douthat to your own context and area of study. But, I wonder how you think discipleship will mitigate the heresies highlighted in the text. How are we to determine what ‘genuine’ discipleship really is? I am sure Osteen has discipleship groups and there are certainly disciples of Focus on the Family, Larry Burkett and any of the other heresies that met his gaze. Do you not think in light of that we should focus on the orthodoxy first before we launch into some misguided discipleship philosophies?
Thanks for your comment Dan. I appreciate your digging in with some good questions. Yes, I think orthodoxy should lead to orthopraxy. I appreciate Douthat’s questioning people’s belief and the way it leads to action and I guess I took for granted in my post/research that the stance I take is from a historic Wesleyan place which came out of the Anglicans and Catholics before that. I can trace the beliefs through time and how they have morphed while some of these you mention I am not so sure could have the same roots. There is also the implications for where heresy leads one in their practice. This is what’s so telling with people in my opinion. I see a lot of people who are part of my tribe who have not been discipled in our belief and do all sorts of stuff that makes no sense and could even be seen as heretical. This is a main motivation of my research and I am glad for your pointing out the needed link that I presupposed.
Interesting to think about discipleship and disciple-making as a solution for the problem Douthat addresses. As a pastor myself, I find my experience very similar to the ones you interviewed. I would add that there is usually an organic nature to it. There are some people in my congregation who I cannot disciple effectively, for various reasons, but our associate pastor can. Interestingly, Douthat was arguing for “right belief” whereas discipleship, as I understand it, is more about praxis, or as Willard said, “living the kind of life Jesus would live if he were you.” I found Douthat to be a bit more cerebral than Jesus’ understanding of discipleship.
Yes, Chris, others I have interviewed have said there has been an organic side to their discipleship as well (although not all). I am realizing in your and Dan’s comments that I think discipleship integrates both belief and practice whereas you both separated the two. The idea of discipling people is helping them in their journey to follow Jesus which seems to need both belief and obedience. I am assuming that there is training toward right belief but now see that this is more of a modern version of discipleship verses a vintage Jesus perspective from the Gospels. Or is it?
Trisha, I have often tried to remind my congregation that Jesus did not just come to die on the cross, but rather, He also came to train others to take His place after He was gone. You have hit on a large problem that I think is a short-coming of preachers; the failure to train their people to be more than just hearers of the Word. I have seen too many church-goers sitting there with their hands in their laps and their bibles closed, completely relying on the preacher to take care of them. I fear that is why we see so many people with no biblical understanding these days, simply muttering out what they think God likes.
Hi Trish! Great insight and connection to your research! How is your home church implementing discipleship teaching? Are you using this research to create an artifact for this very need? Hope your family is feeling better!
Hi Jean,
Our church does several layers: small groups, individual mentoring, lots of prayer and worship groups who meet regularly and grow in community, along with specific training groups for further growth. We have kind of a hodge podge although it’s been good. I guess I am looking overall at how our denomination and our church might benefit further by understanding and implementing discipleship practices well. Not sure about the artifact yet but I am thinking on it.
Hey Trish, I am going to be following your research closely, but something that is intriguing to me it that while the US produces TONS of resources on making disciples, I’m starting to think that France might be ahead in terms of actually doing that.
One statement that you make concerns me: “they meet with people directly whether in small groups or one on one to be relationally present and walk with them toward Jesus.” It’s the word “they” referring to pastors that gives me pause. One of the things we emphasize in our church plant training is that we don’t just want to make disciples, we want to make disciples who make disciples. The burden of discipleship should not fall solely on the shoulders of the pastort; rather the pastor should be discipling members who can then disciple others, and so on…. It this part of your conversations?
Jenn, I am glad to have your eyes on what I am doing, especially from a different context! Your mentioning us producing so many resources but not actually seeing change is one of the many reasons I am pursuing this work.
Thanks for your concern. As I am interviewing pastors I did ask them what they did and then later asked them all if they see those they are discipling then make disciples of others as well. I specifically ask the first question so I know what they do then ask the others because that’s where I want to see if there are gaps.
Question for you: Do you see people discipling more one on one or in groups? And second, how does that multiply from there (one on one or groups)?
Thanks for this post, Trisha!
This was a helpful review of the book itself, and especially when you turned it to your own research area and interest. I know this wasn’t really the main “intent” of this book, but you’ve utilized it well to step into your focus area. I thought the way that you ended this post, with thoughts on different ways that pastors look at discipleship (in one on one, relationships, small groups, etc) is the part that stood out. It sounds like this is part of your dissertation: the idea that the lack of discipleship activity within churches has been caught up with the overall decline of the church in the West.